uploading symphony 7 to youtube

this was initially written for inclusion in a project entitled 'the cynicide collaboration', which was created on the initiative of jon and included myself on bass and sean on vocals. it was supposed to be a straight ahead alternative rock song, which was the style of that act, and you can hear the remnants of that within the song structure. that project never got off of the ground, so the track was moved to it's successor project: rabit iz wolf, which consisted of just myself and sean. a 25+ minute version exists with sean on vocals, but we eventually agreed that it was not a rabit iz wolf song but one of my own projects with sean on vocals (rabit was moving towards a psychedelic folk feel, while this track moves into industrial and noisy ambience). rabit didn't break up so much as it faded away; after some time, i decided that i wanted to replace the vocals, which were heavily modified and came off as sort of awkward. they were replaced with samples, and the track was turned into a dark, satirical attack on everything from the mainstream media's approach to the 9/11 attacks to internet dating sites and what would eventually turn into sites like facebook. in time, i grew tired of explaining the message to people who completely misinterpreted it and simply removed the samples, leaving a 25 minute noise-rock catastrophe that sounds roughly something like a collaboration between trent reznor, sonic youth and boredoms and that i've labelled as my fourth symphony.

this was written in 2001, constructed/composed/recorded in roughly it's current form in 2002, remixed in 2003, reassembled in 2007 and remastered in 2009. i think i'm finally done with it...

that does, however, leave multiple existing versions of the track. they will all be dumped onto bandcamp in the near future. for now, there is only this one:



i'm also going to point out that the idea of a "trepanation nation" has been picked up recently by some metal bands. i'm not a fan of metal, and doubt i had much influence on their adoption of the concept. however, i did think it up *first* and will not take kindly to suggestions otherwise. it may be coincidence, but they have to eat that, not me. sorry. my primary influences at the time were as mentioned.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=658axrUn-7w

uploading symphony 6 to youtube

this came out of a two-person psychedelic folk project i was working in over late 2001 and into mid 2002. we had brainstormed the idea of a piece that slowly built itself up, like a wave, and that had sporadic pieces of poetry interspersed as it did so. of the two of us, i was the musician, and he was the poet; i generally produced the music by myself. however, my vision of the track proved to be much larger than his, to the point that the two ideas could not be effectively reconciled given the deficit of technology available to us (i simply couldn't find a way to get enough resources to condense the track to under ten minutes). that left me with this seventy minute ambient piece that has mostly stayed hidden in my closet over the last twelve years.

this is very much process music. it's built on 36 distinct loops of identical length (just under 57 seconds) that assemble the collage up on a loop by loop basis, hitting it's full point only in the 35th loop. the 36th loop does not fit into any of the patterns that define the first 35, but is nonetheless the climax of the piece. this is followed by a disassembling process that is precisely the reverse of the assembling process.

as process music, this is mostly meant as background music. also, headphones help substantially.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQdW5_lKtUY

i've stated before that i have the mind of a 70 year-old woman in the body of a 12 year-old girl. but i was sort of joking.

it's not that strange for people to skip their childhood. childhood is really a social construction in the first place. the truth is it's the parents that won't let go of the innocence; in reality, most of the world is working at ten and reproducing at fifteen. keeping young people juvenile throughout their teens and even into their twenties requires huge amounts of biological and psychological suppression. rather than saying "i skipped childhood", the better idea might be "i escaped the christian cult's attempt to stunt my development to uphold their warped perceptions of purity".

but, i don't expect white liberals to lose their fantasy reality any time soon.

so, skipping childhood is common and normal; it's the idea of childhood that is perverted. but, skipping adulthood is really bizarre.

i mean skipping adulthood as a phase of life, rather than having any cultural affinity with people twice my age. the entire set of goals just seemed pointless to me. property? what for? vehicles? i'd prefer something more ecological. job? status? you know you're going to die, right? what's the point? partner? i prefer my independence and i need to spend most of my time alone, anyways - it's impossible for me to maintain a relationship with the need for that much alone time. children? i'd rather be paraded through downtown by my entrails than become a slave to my offspring, thank you.

it was the goals of retirement that appealed to me directly from childhood: time to read, a space to grow a garden and maybe a pet (at this point, though, i think pets are as much enslavement as children).

i mean, we have some pretty bizarre ideas of what an adult is in our society. the definition of an adult in our society is identical to that of a slave. then, we associate adulthood with freedom. 'cause freedom and slavery are the same thing, here.

but to just skip the entire phase of existence - the dominant phase, the defining phase - is something i'm having a hard time understanding in myself, even as it is crystal clear to me that it is true.